August 2005 Archives

I'm not too far from Toronto and the immediate impact of Katrina is pretty light here. It started to rain last night around 11 pm but nothing too serious. It was still raining when I woke up this morning but it's already showing signs of clearing up.

But it appears there will be some long term impact.

Gas prices in Canada jump 20 cents overnight

Motorists pulling up to the pumps this morning may be wishing they filled up yesterday, after prices jumped overnight by as much as 20 cents a litre.

In Toronto, the price of gasoline at some stations was about $1.24 a litre. And in Montreal, gas prices hit $1.15 a litre.
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The price hikes come amid reports of massive damage caused by hurricane Katrina, which slammed into the U.S. Gulf Coast on Monday.

Katrina sent seven oil rigs adrift and forced the closure of eight refineries in the Gulf region -- where about 12 per cent of American refining capacity is concentrated, according to Matt Barasch of RBC Dominion Securities.

As the article suggests, expect to see price increases on a lot of things that move by truck, like produce. And expect to pay more to heat your home this winter.

I've seen Katrina touted as a rehearsal for a possible flu pandemic. It also looks like a preview of peak oil.

In case Timmy doesn't buy my previous suggestion I thought of another one after I booted up today and checked my email.

I want to be the Email Avenger with the power to instantly track down spammers and hang them by their toes in the town square where little kids armed with big sticks can beat on them like pinatas.

Timmy the G asked me earlier today to answer to a question. (He also thinks I'm too serious. The act is working.)

If you were a super hero, what would your name be, and what would your super power be?

I'm hardly the first in the blogosphere to write about U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins' recent remarks concerning the softwood lumber dispute. Wilkins encouraged Canadians to stop the emotional rhetoric regarding the American refusal to abide by the NAFTA and come back to the negotiating table. I wouldn't be the first Canadian blogger who's looking for a polite way to tell Mr. Wilkins to blow it out his ear.

So I'm pleased to see some fairly sharp statements from Canadian cabinet ministers in response, though I'm not ready to assume that there's anything more than talk here.

Industry Minister David Emerson said David Wilkins comments, made in an interview with the Ottawa Citizen's editorial board and published Friday, are hypocritical because they suggest Canada hasn't been serious about negotiating.

The minister said Canadians may need to start gearing up for a trade war with the United States.

"I don't want to engage in the very kind of excess the ambassador may be inviting,' said Goodale. "I would advise him to take his own advice."

And finally we have Trade Minister Jim Peterson.

Trade Minister Jim Peterson said the ambassador should tell Washington "that they should not confuse emotion with commitment and determination by Canadians to ensure the NAFTA is respected."

At this rate I'm not going have to expend near as much energy sending snark in the direction of David Wilkins as I did with The Mouth From Massachusetts. The government's going to do it for me.

Like the subject of the post below this one, depleted uranium is a subject that only surfaces once in a while and rarely in the major media outlets. It's possible that's going to change. Over a year ago I blogged a story in the New York Daily News on members of a New York National Guard Unit who had returned from tours of duty in Iraq and been tested for DU exposure at the newspaper's expense. The story seemed to die quickly but the Connecticut state legislature may be about to breathe some new life into it.

I expect that before long there will be someone around to remind me in comments that there is still no proof that the use of DU in weapons poses any health risk (aside from the fact that they're weapons, of course). But if the Pentagon continues to actively avoid testing troops and to suppress any information that runs counter to its claim that there's no problem here, we'll have to take our proof where we can find it.

Gerard Matthew thought he was lucky. He returned from his Iraq tour a year and a half ago alive and in one piece. But after the New York State National Guardsman got home, he learned that a bunkmate, Sgt. Ray Ramos, and a group of N.Y. Guard members from another unit had accepted an offer by the New York Daily News and reporter Juan Gonzalez to be tested for depleted uranium (DU) contamination, and had tested positive.

Matthew, 31, decided that since he?d spent much of his time in Iraq lugging around DU-damaged equipment, he?d better get tested too. It turned out he was the most contaminated of them all.

Matthew immediately urged his wife to get an ultrasound check of their unborn baby. They discovered the fetus had a condition common to those with radioactive exposure: atypical syndactyly. The right hand had only two digits.
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No one knows how many U.S. soldiers have been contaminated by DU residue. Despite regulations authorizing tests for any military personnel who suspects exposure, the U.S. military is avoiding doing those tests?or delaying them until they are meaningless.

?When we asked to be tested at Ft. Dix, they wrongly told us we didn?t have to worry unless we had DU fragments in our body,? says Matthew. His buddy, Sgt. Ramos, who exhibits symptoms resembling radiation sickness and heavy metal poisoning, adds that at Walter Reed Medical Center he was grilled for hours about why he wanted to be tested and was then branded a troublemaker by his own unit. Matthew says Walter Reed ?lost? his sample.

At the war?s start, the United States refused to allow U.N. or other environmental inspectors to test DU levels within Iraq. Now the United Nations won?t even go near Iraq because of security concerns.
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Gonzalez and the Daily News paid for costlier tests for nine Guardsmen?tests that could pinpoint uranium inside the body and identify the special isotope signature of man-made DU. Four of the nine tested positive for DU; all had symptoms of uranium poisoning.

Even harder evidence may soon arrive. Connecticut State Representative Pat Dillon (D-New Haven), a Yale-trained epidemiologist, has crafted state-level legislation that Connecticut and Louisiana have unanimously passed, authorizing returned National Guard troops to request and receive specialized DU contamination tests at the Pentagon?s expense. This approach bypasses the Pentagon?s feet-dragging because National Guard troops fall under state, rather than federal, jurisdiction.

It seems a bit strange to me to claim that you're liberating people when you're fouling their environment with poison.

It's been almost a year since I last posted about the Great Lakes Annex Agreement, aka Annex 2001. That's mainly because I haven't seen anything more in the news about it. And even this might have slipped by were it not for an op-ed in today's Toronto Star by Tony Clarke of the Polaris Institute.

The concern a year ago was that what was supposed to be an effort to conserve and preserve might end up opening the floodgates (pun intended again) to wholesale diversions of water from the Great Lakes basin. According to Clarke there's a provision in the final draft of the agreement that does just that. He calls it a loophole. I think he has a gift for understatement.

Under [Article 207.9], water bottling companies will have free rein to extract water from any of the five Great Lakes and package it for human consumption, provided the containers they use are 20 litres or smaller in size.

But Clarke points out the greater danger here.

Even more disturbing, is the danger that Article 207.9 provides yet another tool for corporations to open the floodgates for bulk water takings and exports. Under international trade treaties like the North American Free Trade Agreement, water is understood to be an economic good.

Once water, as an economic good, is extracted and sold for commercial purpose, no government or regulatory regime would be allowed to put a ban or even a quota on it.

In other words, since Article 207.9 permits companies to extract water from the Great Lakes basin for sale as bottled water, it triggers the provisions and rules of NAFTA. Once this happens, there is nothing to stop a bulk water export company ? or consortium of companies ? from using the rules of NAFTA to compel governments to lift their restrictions on bulk water takings from the Great Lakes.

To be sure, the architects of the Annex want to conserve and protect the Great Lakes basin against bulk water takings. But, the Annex also makes it clear that its regulatory measures are subordinate to international trade treaties and laws. In short, the rules of NAFTA trump the standards and measures outlined in the Annex.

Cross-posted to the E-Group.

Would this be a good time to remind everyone that Bush is a uniter, not a divider?

American Legion Declares War on Protestors -- Media Next?

The American Legion, which has 2.7 million members, has declared war on antiwar protestors, and the media could be next. Speaking at its national convention in Honolulu, the group's national commander called for an end to all ?public protests? and ?media events? against the war, even though they are protected by the Bill of Rights.

"The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples," Thomas Cadmus, national commander, told delegates at the group's national convention in Honolulu.

The delegates voted to use whatever means necessary to "ensure the united backing of the American people to support our troops and the global war on terrorism."

In his speech, Cadmus declared: "It would be tragic if the freedoms our veterans fought so valiantly to protect would be used against their successors today as they battle terrorists bent on our destruction.?

Hat-tip to Bump.

My involvement with the Flu Wiki has certainly taught me that a serious flu pandemic might bring lots of consequences that hadn't immediately occurred to me. For example, see this discussion of potential economic effects.

But here's one that still hadn't occurred to me.

SARS lawsuits against Ontario get the go-ahead

An Ontario judge ruled Tuesday that two lawsuits launched over Ontario's handling of the SARS crisis two years ago can proceed.

Both lawsuits charge that the government put the province's economic interests ahead of the safety of its nurses.

One suit is a $600 million class action by Andrea Williams, a nurse who became infected with SARS on the verge of a second outbreak in May 2003. Williams was exposed to SARS while undergoing a surgical procedure at North York General Hospital in Toronto.

The other is a $12 million suit brought by the family of nurse Nelia Laroza, who died in June. Laroza was an orthopedic nurse at the same hospital.

Ian Welsh, who started the discussion on economic consequences of a pandemic linked to above at the Flu Wiki, has a followup at Tilting At Windmills.

The New York Times has the optimistic take on Iraqi constitutional negotiations.

Leaders in Iraq Report Progress on Constitution

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Monday, Aug. 22 -Iraqi leaders moved to the brink of agreement on a new constitution on Sunday, solving several contentious issues but still struggling with the potentially explosive questions of Shiite autonomy and the role of Islam in family disputes and the judiciary.

The Iraqis said they were hoping to finish the constitution by the end of the day on Monday, a deadline that they have already extended once. They scheduled a meeting of the National Assembly for Monday evening, when they hoped to present a finished constitution for approval.
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"It looks like all the major issues are resolved, and we hope tomorrow we will work out the remaining details," said the American official, who, because of the diplomatic delicacy, spoke on condition of anonymity.

A potentially more intractable problem in the long run was the disaffection of Sunni leaders, who have been largely excluded from the deliberations during the past week. The constitution has been written almost entirely by Shiite and Kurdish leaders, who said they had decided to leave the Sunnis out because they were being too inflexible.

The Globe and Mail has picked up an Associated Press story and slapped a slightly different headline on it.

Negotiator doubts Iraq will meet constitution deadline

Baghdad ? Hours before a midnight deadline, Shiites and Kurds reached an agreement Monday on a draft constitution and were trying to persuade Sunni Arabs to go along with their compromises, officials said.

But a Sunni negotiator said he doubts a deal on a draft constituiion for Iraq can be met "in the next few hours."

Back in March Lloyd Axworthy stirred things up a bit with his open letter to Condi Rice. He's at it again in this op-ed piece on our relations with our neighbour to the south. There's a blunt assessment of the current U.S. administration:

The reality is that we are dealing with an American political system currently steeped in the ideology of "empire." It recognizes few rules, adheres only to those treaties that are expedient to basic interests, and believes that the only political currency that counts is the exercise of raw power.

Let's begin by seriously considering an end to NAFTA and reliance instead upon the World Trade Organization to regulate the terms and provisions of free trade.

Not only would this offer us the protection of a trade body that has some teeth in its regulations ? ones not rooted in U.S. domestic procedures and laws ? it would also free us to engage in a much more innovative and active global trade strategy.

The emergence of new economic powers like China, India, Brazil and South Africa provides markets hungry for the resources and know-how that Canada possesses.

Our NAFTA connection impedes our ability to take advantage of this potential. To make this work, however, we have to pull up our own socks and tackle long-neglected or perhaps too-sensitive domestic issues.

It's a bit hypocritical to blame the Americans for problems of freshwater pollution when we have been so remiss in our own water management. Despite more than a decade of federal-provincial negotiation, there is still no sign of a national freshwater policy. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans spends most of its funds on ocean fish and salty seawater, largely ignoring its responsibility to research and monitor our valuable freshwater resources.

Since the demise of the National Energy Policy in the 1980s, there is nothing resembling a co-ordinated energy strategy that would see, for example, a national power grid or effective incentives for renewable alternatives.

And, as the the cost of fuel skyrockets, revenues from the windfall are not evenly distributed.

Add to this list a moribund industrial-development policy, a fractured Department of Trade and Foreign Affairs that can't seem to produce a unified policy, a piecemeal approach to higher education and innovation, a crumbling national infrastructure, and an increasingly restrictive immigration regime.

The bottom line is that the essentials of a vibrant public domain, capable of taking greater control of our own decisions and pursuing global economic and security initiatives in a forceful, made-in-Canada way, are not being built.

Today's Vancouver Sun has an interesting article on the growing presence of American law enforcement agencies on Canadian soil. It's called, appropriately enough, The Long Arm of Uncle Sam. The law enforcement spokespeople from both countries see the increasing cross-border co-operation as both inevitable and beneficial. Crime is global, you see. But I'd suggest that we've gone well beyond cooperation when a court in Seattle can seize property on Canadian soil.

The U.S. Attorney prosecuting three Canadians in the cross-border drug tunnel case will ask a Seattle judge next week to seize the B.C. property on which the tunnel was constructed.

A court order would mean the little piece of Canada on Zero Avenue would be surrendered to the U.S. government if property owner Francis Devandra Raj is convicted on trafficking charges, regardless of whether individuals or banks in Canada have an outstanding claim on the Langley land.

The Emery case is a telling case in this sense -- there were DEA agents on Canadian soil operating purportedly with the approval or under the supervision of the Vancouver Police Department, but when it became necessary to record phone calls placed by U.S. agents to Emery's seed store, the U.S. agents returned to American soil in order to record those conversations. Perhaps the reason is because those agents would be prohibited by law from doing so on Canadian soil.

Canada to act against U.S. in softwood dispute

It seems Finance Minister Ralph Goodale gave a speech today in which he acknowledged that trade disputes with the U.S. have been a "very painful experience."

But never fear. Ralph is promising action on softwood lumber. Or something.

While he did not set a timeline, Goodale said [International Trade Minister Jim] Peterson is considering Canada's options - which could include litigation or trade sanctions.

"He will no doubt be coming to cabinet very shortly to outline what the options might be and seek support for that," Goodale said.

"We're still in the very early stages of it. We're not in a position yet to define the exact strategy, but we want to send a very clear signal that Canada takes this very, very seriously."

The Jurist points us to this article in which a lawyer representing the U.S. government explains why Maher Arar's rights weren't violated when he was detained in the airport in New York and shipped off to Syria for torture. It seems Arar didn't have any rights because he wasn't really in New York. He just thought he was.

A senior lawyer for the U.S. government has told a judge hearing a lawsuit over Maher Arar's deportation to Syria that foreign citizens passing through American airports have almost no rights.

At most, Mary Mason told a hearing in Brooklyn, N.Y., passengers would have the right not to be subjected to "gross physical abuse."
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Mason said the U.S. government is interpreting its powers in such a way that passengers never intending to enter the U.S. connecting to international flights at U.S. airports must prove they are no threat and could be allowed to enter the country.

If passengers are deemed to be inadmissible, they have no constitutional rights even if later taken to an American prison. Mason told Judge David Trager that's because they are deemed to be still outside the U.S., from a legal point of view.
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Mason said the interpretation means travellers can be detained without charge, denied the right to consult a lawyer, and even refused necessities such as food and sleep.

Lawyer #1: I've reviewed every relevant statute and precedent and I can't find a thing that doesn't make us look guilty as hell.

Lawyer #2: Just pull something out of your ass and see if the judge buys it. It's been working so far. And even if he does rule against us, we'll just ignore it anyway.

Once again, our good friends at Monsanto are back in the news attempting to take control over yet another sector of our food production.

Monsanto is justly famous, or rather infamous, for foisting genetically modified canola on us. The plant has become a noxious weed in some areas. It freely cross pollinates with non GM canola passing on it's GM payload and prompting Monsanto to sue farmers whose crops show the patented genes whether or not the farmer has ever knowingly grown the Monsanto version. They are equally infamous for introducing "terminator seeds" that produce sterile offspring.

This time the target is our morning bacon. Or at least the pigs that produce it. According to Reuters, Monsanto wants to branch out into control of livestock genetics as well.

Monsanto Company, already a world powerhouse in biotech crops, is shaking up the swine industry with plans to patent pig-breeding techniques and lay claim to the animals born as a result.

Agricultural experts are scrambling to assess how these patents might affect the market, while consumer activists warn that if the company is granted pig-related patents, on top of its tight rein on key feed and food crops, its control over agriculture could be unprecedented.

"We're afraid that Monsanto and other big companies are getting control of the world's genetic resources," said Christoph Then, a patent expert with Greenpeace in Germany....

"We applied for a patent ... for some specific reproductive processes in swine," said Monsanto spokesman Chris Horner. "Any pigs that would be produced using this reproductive technique would be covered by these patents."

The practices Monsanto wants to patent basically involve identifying genes that result in desirable traits in swine, breeding animals to achieve those traits and using a specialized device to inseminate sows deeply in a way that uses less sperm than is typically required....

The concerns over Monsanto's patents are two-pronged. One relates to how the patent claims involving the animals themselves would be used. There have been hundreds of animal patents granted over the last several years, including claims on salmon, chimps and mice. But the majority are genetically modified animals used in laboratory research, not common farm animals.

Some fear that Monsanto one day could be filing patent infringement lawsuits against pig farmers. Monsanto already has a track record of suing farmers whose crops contain some of the company's patented genetic plant technology....

Critics also say it is not apparent that Monsanto has actually invented anything new in swine reproduction. They say the company is simply trying to lay claim to a combination of practices already used along with genetic selection that occurs in nature.

I might have a bit more sympathy for American views on our marijuana laws (or lack thereof) if they showed the slightest concern about the epidemic of gun smuggling into Canada. That concern however is completely non-existent.

Meantime, hardly a day passes without news of some shooting in a Canadian city -- often gang-related and too often devastating to innocent bystanders like Shaquan Cadougan, the four-year-old from Toronto. The Malvern Crew came under public scrutiny last year after a stray bullet flew through the wall of a home in north Scarborough, killing Derek Wah Yan, 40, and later when an innocent 21-year-old, Omar Hortley, was gunned down on a city sidewalk. The four-day spate of shootings in Vancouver that garnered so much attention last year claimed the life of a man walking on a thoroughfare during rush hour (police believe he had run out of gas). In Montreal, a 30-year-old man was wounded 18 months ago during a gang shootout outside an apartment block.

Why then, is gun smuggling not a top-line subject in the ongoing negotiations to strengthen border controls? If Washington complains of terrorist cells operating north of the border, or hydroponic pot pouring southward, surely Canada has a legitimate gripe about U.S. guns endangering its police and creating a lethal environment in its cities. Where is the quid pro quo?

The answer, of course, lies in the elephant-and-mouse imbalance that has always defined Canada-U.S. relations. While the U.S. leans heavily on Ottawa to harmonize its immigration screening and border security to weed out terrorists, Canada must focus on protecting its $680-billion trade relationship with the U.S., and has little leverage for its own demands. "This would be very hard to get on any kind of binational agenda," says Reginald Stuart, an expert in Canada-U.S. relations at Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax. "There's just no constituency in the United States to support it at a federal level." One problem is money. Even if the ATF wants more funds for anti-smuggling operations, says Stuart, a past scholar at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, "the answer's going to be 'okay, get in line'."

Another problem is America's ongoing love affair with firearms, which gun control advocates say blinds it to the fears of its neighbours. The latest statistics indicate there's a gun in America for nearly every one of the country's 280 million people, and the anti-firearms lobby is getting nowhere with Republicans in control of Congress and the White House. While the ATF and other agencies have worked diligently to help Canadian police, the sheer volume of firearms south of the border makes their work appear futile. To Josh Horwitz, executive director of the Washington-based Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, this alone justifies Ottawa sticking its nose into American affairs. "We need to hear from other countries who say, 'We've done all we can. We need help,'" he says. "You have a role in this debate."

We do indeed, and right now we are hampering our own efforts to control the flow of guns by giving ridiculously ineffective punishments to those caught smuggling. Right now, smuggling a gun across the border can get you a fine of $300-400, far less than the street value of the weapon being smuggled. If you're a criminal, it makes good economic sense to bring in illegal guns.

For a brief moment, the dream was tantalizingly close. Looks like the whole Bush indictment thing is untrue. This website does a good job shooting it down:

I have family connections in Chicago and this story is pure wishful thinking and impure and self-serving invention. There are NO indictments of any kind issued, either against Bush and Cheney, Rehnquist and Scalia or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

In the past, some of these 'great" reporters have put out stories that sounded like they were written by the Grimm Brothers. "Johnny Gosch, Kidnapped and Raped Paper Boy, is a Republican Sex slave" is one of the more bizarre of these, "Plasmoid Clouds destroyed the WTC" is another, as is the ludicrous story "from a high-level German intelligence officer" about an atomic bomb going off over Houston last Christmas, and other similar manic howlers.

Now, we are breathlessly informed, Flocco's website was "attacked and removed" by a secret FBI operation! More than likely, it was taken down because he did not pay the bill. Since the "indictment" story is pure fiction, I highly doubt if the FBI would waste their time with it or him.

This is not 'great reporting' but it is destructive, self-seeking nonsense, designed for, and lauded by, unhappy people with serious personality problems who are the kind that desperately want to believe in mysterious plots, ?inside? information and secret societies. It gives them communion with other such unhappy campers and they feel that in unity there is strength. After all, they alone know the Real Truth, and this knowledge will make them free.

Sorry to get your hopes up, folks.

While cruising around the Technorati website today, I noticed one of the top ten searches for the day was "Bush indictment". What the heck? said I, surely this should be major news if it's true.

There is no confirmation yet in the mainstream media, but there is a fairly meaty story here on the subject:

Sources close to the Chicago federal grand jury probe into perjury and obstruction charges against President Bush and others said indictments were handed down this week, but a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney?s Office of the Northern District of Illinois refused to comment.

?We are not talking about any aspect of this case and our office is not commenting on anything regarding the investigation at this time,? said Randall Sanborn from the office of U.S. federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the attorney conducting the grand jury probe into whether Bush and others in his administration violated federal law in a number of sensitive areas, including the Valerie Plame CIA leak case, involvement in 9/11 and the illegal nature of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In December 2003, Fitzgerald was named Special Counsel to investigate the alleged disclosure of the identity of who leaked information in the Plame case, but the present grand jury probe has expanded to include the wide-reaching crime allegations as new information surfaced.

Although the U.S. Attorney?s office in Chicago is staying silent, it is well known that Fitzgerald is digging deep into an assortment of serious improprieties among many Bush administration figures based, in part, on subpoenaed testimony provided by former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

According to federal whistleblower Tom Heneghen, who recently reported on www.truthradio.com, Powell testified before the citizen grand jury that President Bush had taken the U.S. to war illegally based on lies, which is a capital crime involving treason under the U.S. Code.

?Regarding the Powell testimony, there is no comment,? said Sanborn.

However, sources close to the federal grade jury probe also allegedly told Heneghen a host of administration figures besides Bush were also indicted, including Vice-President Richard Cheney, Chief of Staff Andrew Card, Cheney Chief of Staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, former Attorney General John Ashcroft, imprisoned New York Times reporter Judith Miller and former Senior Cheney advisor Mary Matalin.

Heneghen, unavailable for comment and first reported by internet reporter Tom Flocco, allegedly also told sources White House Advisor Karl Rove was indicted for perjury in a major document shredding operation cover-up and that Prime Minister Tony Blair was also indicted for obstruction of justice charges.

Heneghen also claimed that Blair failed to honor a subpoena issued by Fitzpatrick and is now consulting with British legal counsel on how to avoid appearing in Chicago.

In recent weeks, there has been much controversy over Fitzgerald?s wide reaching probe which is extending far beyond the Bush administration to include what some have called ?a wholesale cleansing? of a crime-laden White House and Congress.

Fitzgerald?s investigation is said to be also centered on members of the 9/11 Commission, members on both sides of the isle in the House and Senate and also select high-powered members of the media.

Needless to say, members close to the administration are ?fighting mad? with Fitzgerald and reports on Capital Hill are that Senate intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts is trying to derail Fitzgerald?s probe by calling him to testify before the Senate regarding his true motives behind the investigation.

Political observers are now wondering whether administration-friendly Republican legislators, some under investigation themselves, are conspiring like President Nixon did in Watergate with Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, attempting to fire Fitzgerald in the same manner in order to cool the heat on further investigations into Bush administration crimes.

As I noted earlier, there is nothing yet in the mainstream media, but the subject is quickly becoming the topic of the day on the Internets. I have also posted about this at greater length on Voice in the Wilderness. I will update that post and this one as more information becomes available.

Simon Pole points us to a Vancouver Courier article concerning DEA activity in Canada.

According to Ian Hillman, spokesman for the American consulate in downtown Vancouver, there are four DEA agents working out of the consulate in this city, who are part of what's called an "integrated law enforcement hub," which includes the U.S. Secret Service, the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms bureau (ATF), the FBI and Homeland Security. The Secret Service has been based in Vancouver the longest. Although, perhaps best known for protecting the U.S. president, the Secret Service investigates counterfeit money cases and crimes like credit card fraud.

Hillman said the DEA agents act as liaison officers, meant to help with information exchange with their Canadian counterparts, and to strengthen the integrated border enforcement team, which has existed for a couple of decades. The DEA's assignment in Vancouver, which started about a-year-and-a-half ago, stems from an agreement signed after Sept. 11 to strengthen cross-border cooperation. Another "integrated law enforcement hub" operates in Ottawa and a third is being put together in Toronto.

Anybody want to bet that the agreement wasn't justified by invoking the War on Terror™? Instead it's being used to import the War on (Some) Drugs™ into Canada despite the fact that we have much different views on the subject.

I'm with Simon.

This is absolute madness. And this is also what happens when the political leaders won't speak up. Where are they?

Where's Cotler?

Ladies and gentlemen, meet the Reverend Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church.

Since much of what Rev. Phelps has to say would be considered hate speech under Canadian law, and since it comes into Canada over the internet (though I'm not providing a link), when can we expect American law enforcement officials to arrest the good Reverend and arrange his extradition to Canada to stand trial?

What? Why are you laughing?

Bush uses loophole to send Bolton to UN

U.S. President George W. Bush used a legislative loophole on Monday to appoint John Bolton as his country's ambassador to the United Nations.

In making the announcement in Washington, Bush praised Bolton as someone who "brought people together to achieve meaningful results at the United Nations."

Bolton's critics, including senior Democratic Party senators, had been holding up his confirmation on the grounds that he has long been one of the UN's most vehement critics. He has called the world body both irrelevant and corrupt.

Bush was able to bypass them by using a loophole that allows him to make what's known as a "recess appointment" when Congress is not sitting.

Bush hasn't been shy about using the recess appointment. Among others, he's used it to appoint William Pryor to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and Charles Pickering to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Both men are considered to be extremely conservative and both appointments had previously been blocked in the senate.

Thanks in part to the efforts of people like Steve Clemons, whose blog was all Bolton all the time for a while there, Bolton's nomination received an unprecedented amount of publicity. It will be interesting to see what happens to Bush's already dismal approval numbers now that's he's bypassed a Senate controlled by his own party to install a highly unpopular and thoroughly discredited individual as ambassador to the UN. So much for being a straight shooter.

And since Clemons' Washington Note led the charge against Bolton, I'll give his current guest blogger the last word, except for my own last word.

During this process, the entire tone and tenor of Washington politics has changed, as the US Senate stood up for itself in the face Bush's disrespect for the separation of powers. In the face of hyperbole and disinformation, an opposition steadily built a case that only grew stronger with each passing day. Now, a humiliated Bolton has a long way to go to prove to the rest of America that he deserves the trust he's been given.

Bolton's confirmation was constantly sold as an inevitable fait accompli given President Bush's enormous post-election mandate. Instead, the process worked; Americans got to know John Bolton during the confirmation process, and they didn't like what they saw.